


Let the world know

by lucyelfenmaid



Category: Original Work
Genre: Aromantic charater, Coming Out, Gen, aromantic main character, aromantic spectrum awareness week
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-15
Updated: 2016-02-15
Packaged: 2018-05-20 20:50:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,990
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6024382
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lucyelfenmaid/pseuds/lucyelfenmaid
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An aromantic girl tries to raise awareness in her school.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Let the world know

**Author's Note:**

> This story was written for aromantic spectrum awareness week. It is meant to raise awareness and explain the aromantic spectrum to people through a story.
> 
> Please tell me if anything in this story isn't correct or is in any way exclusive! I'm always happy to correct it and learn new things to become a better person.
> 
> Enough chitchat.  
> Enjoy!

Today's the day! It's the first day of aromantic spectrum awareness week! In the honour of the day, I dress in different shades of green, black, grey and white. I even pin that pride pin that read "not a robot" on a aro-pride coloured background.   
Let the world finally see who I am, I think as I pack the decorations I have spent hours making over the last few weeks.   
My heart is hammering like crazy by the time I arrive at school. I start doubting myself. Am I really ready to do this? To come out to my entire school? For the first lessons, I refuse to take of my coat, in order to hide my pin and the colours of my clothes.  
It isn't until one lesson before lunch that I find the courage to tell my best friend about my romantic orientation. My heartbeat is racing, my hands are shaking and my voice is hesitant when I call his name.  
He looks up from his phone, his familiar smile on his features. It gives me the strength to tell him. I take a deep breath to ground myself.   
It isn't a coming out of the epic kind you hear of online or in movies, it was rather a clumsy conversation that includes a vocabulary lesson on what the term aromantic means and what a romantic orientation is in the first place. It ends with my friend saying "okay" and giving me a small, unsure smile.   
The lesson starts. It is a rather boring, so I don't really pay attention to what the teacher is saying and spend a lot of time watching my friend. I catch him staring at me in a confused and pensive way several times. After about half an hour, he takes out his phone and spends the rest of the lesson doing somethings on it or lost in thoughts.  
As soon as the lesson ends, my friend comes over to me. He seems a little uncomfortable and I'm starting to feel as if he won't accept me for who I am. I know these things need time, that the other person has to get used to it, like I had to, but it still scares me a little. Not that I wouldn't have other friends to hang out with if my best friend would not accept me - I'm a rather popular kid at school - but I do cherish every single friend I have and I'd hate to lose one, especially my best friend.  
On the way to the cafeteria, it turns out that my worries are unfounded. My friend clears his throat and says a little shyly: "So, I've been googling aromanticism during Mr. Gray's lesson and it seems it's aromantic spectrum awareness week? Do you have anything special planed for that?"  
I start laughing. I'm just so glad he tries to be fine with what I told him. He looks at me in bewilderment. I calm down and tell him my plans of decorating the school. He instantly offers his advice, saying that he would start with the he bathrooms. I admit to him that I had thought of the same thing first, but that it has a flaw: as a girl, I will only be able to decorate the girls' bathrooms.   
"Well, that's not a problem anymore. I'll help you," he said with fondness.  
I'm so relieved at hearing this, not because I'll have someone to help me with the decoration, but because I know now that he is still my best friend and he's there for me. I throw my arms around him. "Aww, thank you! You're the best!"  
One of the guys passing by says to his friends : "How long until they are officially dating?"  
We both hear it, look at each other with a knowing smirk at our now shared secret.

After we finished our meal, I hand my friend several handmade stickers with positive or educational messages I have asked people on the internet to send me for this very purpose. We then head off to the different bathrooms and complete our task.

 

On Tuesday, I start to overhear several conversations about those strange messages in the bathrooms and over what people think of aromanticism. Some seem genuinely interested, other blatantly disbelieving, even hateful. The hate was to be expected, I am well aware of this fact, people tend to meet things they don't understand with hatred or disbelief. The positive conversations however give me strength, they show me that what I am doing is worthwhile.   
They are probably also the reason why, when our teacher announces that the person of our class that was supposed to hold a speech for the schools acceptance of differences will not be able to make it, my hand rises on its own to volunteer for taking their place.   
At lunch I ask a bunch of my closer friends who are sitting at the same table if they want to help us with the decorations. I still have several stickers left saying things like 

"We exist.  
-Aromantic spectrum awareness week (15. - 21. Feb.)”

 

Or 

"Friendship isn't worth less than romance.  
-Aromantic spectrum awareness week (15. - 21. Feb.)”

 

And so on. One of my friends asks me why I'm doing this. I explain to her that visibility is important. She wants to know if I know anyone who is aromantic and if that's even a thing. I tell her that, yes, I know someone and she does too. She asks for a name. I tell her mine. She looks surprised and tells me she would never have guessed it. Most of my friends seem rather cool with it. I ask them not to tell anyone, unless I give them my explicit permission. Not that I should have to, it should be common knowledge that outing someone is a no-go, but I want to be sure they understand that. I like to know who knows and who doesn't.

When I come home from school, I don't have time to make more plans for the awareness week, as I have to focus on writing the speech.   
I stay up late, writing, correcting and trying to make it as inclusive and supporting as possible. I only stop working on it when I literally fall asleep on my computer.  
I pend every single break on Wednesday morning on it too, and when I'm finally happy with the result, I post it on several websites for proof reading, just to make sure I hadn't left anything out or said some harmful things. Some people suggest a few changes that I readily accept, and I get a lot of positive messages showing support for what I'm doing and wishing me luck.  
I finish school at two o'clock, then spend the majority of the afternoon revising my speech. I really want it to be good. But the more time I spend doing it, the more I start doubting myself. I'm getting very nervous, but I refuse to give in to my negative thoughts. I know I have to do it, I've come too far to give up. 

The entire school is sitting in the main hall, where a makeshift stage has been built. I am not really listening to the two other speaker, not because of a lack of interest, but because I'm a nervous wreck. I catch myself hoping that something happens to prevent me from having to go up there and talk. But nothing happens. The moderator calls my name. I get up, take the microphone they offer me and clear my throat, acting very confident. 

"Greetings everyone! As some of you have noticed, there have been little black, grey, white and green stickers all across the school with some messages on them. I suppose I owe you an explanation this. As some of the sticker state, it is aromantic spectrum awareness week, a time for all aro-spec and aro-allies to raise awareness about that spectrum. You might have noticed, I have used the word aro, which is a shortened term for aromantic, one I'll be using again in this speech.   
"I'm assuming you haven't all seen the stickers with the definition of aro or aro-spec on it, so I'll do my best to explain it to you. You are probably all aware that you can have different sexual orientations, like homosexual and heterosexual, some of you might even have heard of bisexual, pansexual, asexual and so on. Well, there are also romantic orientations, which are the romantic equivalent of the sexual orientation. You can use different labels depending on what gender you are romantically attracted to, for example homoromantic, heteroromantic and so forth. Aromantic people never or only very rarely experience romantic attraction towards anyone.  
Now, like any other thing that is related to orientations, aromanticism exists on a spectrum. Some people are very strongly aromantic and never experience any romantic attraction, some are even repulsed by the idea of romance, other however do experience romantic attraction every now and then, but still very rarely only under certain circumstances. Those still fall in the aromantic spectrum. For example, there are the demi-romantic people, who only experience romantic attraction after an emotional bond has been established or grey-romantic people, also called grey-aromantic people, form whom romantic attraction is very seldom. There are a lot of other orientation that fall on the aromantic spectrum, like lithromantic or akoiromantic, aroflux, cupioromantic and so on, but I don't really have time to go into the details of all other orientations.   
"Now that I've given you an idea of what aro-spec is, or at least I hope so, I'd like to point out that romantic and sexual orientations don't need to be matching. Someone can be aromantic and experience sexual attraction to someone."  
I make a pause in order to drink something and let it all sink in.  
"You may be wondering now, why on earth would aromantics and aro-spec people need awareness. Well, let me tell you. Before I knew aromanticism was a thing, I used to feel worthless. Now, why is that? you're probably wondering. Society keeps making such a big deal out of romance, making it look like a having a romantic relationship is all that matters in life, that you can't be happy without a romantic partner. I wish I had known back in 7th grade, when all my friend started dating, that I wasn't alone, that I wasn't broken. When I discovered the term aromantic and found an online community of people experiencing the same thing, I could finally start to accept myself. Raising awareness helps people who feel lost, alone and broken find a term and a community that understands them. That, in my eyes, is the most important reason to raise awareness.  
"But there are other reasons, like informing people of our existence, so we don't have to give them a vocabulary lesson every time we come out to. And also to teach them acceptance. Aros face a lot of hate and invalidation when they come out. Answers like "That's not even a thing!", "You just haven't met The One yet." and "Oh, so you don't feel anything?" are sadly much too common. Several aros who aren't asexuals face a lot of slut shaming and aromantic relationships are often seen as lesser relationships."

I then talk about what sort of relationships aromantics could be in, explain different kinds of attractions and some harmful stereotypes and proceeded to answer questions. Then I leave the stage to go sit in the audience to listen to the moderator explain the workshop that are to take place after lunch.   
The students are dismissed and the hall starts to gradually empty itself. I stand up and am about to leave when another student catches up with me and smiles at me.

"Thank you. That was very brave of you. It's always great to hear someone speak up for us."


End file.
